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Sunday Ramblings

August 14, 2005

This is the last day of my vacation. In just a few hours I’m going to be heading back to the city and getting back to real life. How disappointing. Thankfully this was a good and relaxing week. Since I am not feeling too reflective today, I thought I’d ramble a little bit about what I accomplished did this week.

Read. I read four complete books and got most of the way through another. I guess that averages a couple of hundred pages per day. I even read one book that had absolutely nothing to do with Christianity (something I only do a few times per year).

Friends. A couple of sets of aunts/uncles/cousins came by and I spent a good bit of time with them. I also caught up with my friend Gerard (who posts in the forums as drareg) and his family. This was the first time I really had the opportunity to meet his wife and his children. It was great to see that he has done awfully well for himself!

Sunset. I’m not sure why, but for some reason I watched only one of the seven sunsets I could have seen. Our dock looks over the lake and the sun sets below the far shore. It is quite a sight.

Swam. I hate swimming, but I forced myself into the water three or four times. The fish were really active this week and everyone was remarking about getting bitten. Thankfully most of the fish are of the toothless variety (sunfish, etc). It is more annoying than painful to have these fish nibbling on toes, fingers, moles or whatever else they might confuse with dinner.

Ate. Too much, but I’m on vacation so allowed myself some leeway. Shame on me.

Blogged. Not as much as I usually do, but I decided to keep blogging through my vacation. While I posted every day, I was not able to track the subsequent discussions as my connection up here is discouragingly slow and I have to dial-up over a shared phone line.

Worshipped. We had a great time of family worship last Sunday with Phil Johnson standing in as preacher. None of us remembered to bring along a sermon tape, so I snooped around my hard drive and found a collection of Phil Johnson sermons I downloaded a couple of years ago. We listened to a sermon (or perhaps a seminar) on justification that was very well-done.

Played. I’m not one of those parents who really enjoys playing games with the kids, but I’m usually up for some sports or other fun. So I played with the kids, read to them, and made sure we had a good time together.

Dated. Aileen and I celebrated our anniversary this week with a nice trip to Kingston, a nearby city that is beautiful and fun to visit.

Sold. My parents sold the cottage this week. So this is my last year at the cottage I’ve visited every summer since I was born. In fact, I was here before I was born, as my mother remembers sitting with the next door neighbour as they dangled their feet in the water and talked about their pregnancies. A couple of weeks after I was born, the neighbour gave birth to Nick who has long been a great friend, though one I see only very occasionally.

Today I am going to hang around for a little while and then pack my bags and leave. I will swing by again next weekend to pick up Aileen and the kids, as they’ve decided to stay up here with the rest of my family for another week. So I will be “baching” it for the next few days, something I am quite looking forward to as it will allow me to work extremely long hours and get a lot of work done.

About Tim Challies

I am a follower of Jesus Christ, a husband to Aileen and a father to three young children. I worship and serve as a pastor at Grace Fellowship Church in Toronto, Ontario, and am a co-founder of Cruciform Press.